Electronic Cigarette Batteries – The Ultimate Guide

As you probably know by now, the three components needed to make an electronic cigarette work are the atomiser, the nicotine liquid, and the battery. The battery is the component that supplies the current to make atomiser work and vaporize the liquid. Without the battery you would simply be inhaling raw liquid rather than a vapour.

But batteries go a bit beyond simply powering atomiser. The type of battery you use goes a long way in determining the flavour, mist, and heat that your electronic cigarette provides. So let's break down some of these different types of batteries to see what it's all about.

High Resistance Battery

Many faithful users of e-cigs were content then out of the box for a little while. But after the novelty wore off, some of them decided they missed the heat and the throat-hit of the tobacco cigarette, and they set out to find a way to fix that. Enter high resistance (HR) batteries. These batteries, also known as high voltage (HV), have more power under the hood, which results in higher heat and greater vapour output. They're also known to create a more intense flavour.

The only problem with the high resistance battery is that it puts a lot of wear and tear on a standard or low-resistance atomiser. In fact, if you use a high-resistance battery with a low resistance atomiser you will significantly reduce the life of the atomiser. You should use high resistance batteries with high resistance atomisers. The same can be said about very high resistance/voltage (VHR/VHV) batteries. Also keep in mind that the higher your battery voltage the more e-juice you're going to use.

Low Resistance Battery

Although you may think otherwise, the low resistance/low voltage (LR/LV) battery accomplishes the same thing as the high resistance system, just with a lower voltage. The point of this system is to accomplish the same intense flavour and misting properties in a much smaller package. With low resistance batteries you don't get the same power draw, but since you're also using a low resistance atomiser you don't need it. If you use a low resistance battery on a standard or high resistance atomiser, your flavour and vapour mist will be negligible.

Protected Battery

A protected battery has a small circuit board built right into it for the purposes of protecting it from a variety of issues. For example, many e-smokers (also known as a vapers) don't run their batteries down to full discharge because performance suffers a noticeably. That means they might be slapping an unprotected battery on the charger when there's still 25% of the charge remaining. This process causes the batteries "memory" function to assume the battery is drained when it's not, which also results in overcharging. This constant cycle of under draining in overcharging shortens the life of your battery dramatically.

Another benefit of protected batteries is that the circuit board also has a built-in cut off to prevent it from overheating; something that can happen if the user draws too long and too frequently. Overheating batteries are bad for atomisers, they have a significantly shorter life, and they could also potentially explode inside your e-cigarette. Having a protected battery solves all these problems. On the other hand, they are not as much fun for modders who might be looking for a maximum power draw every time.

Unprotected Battery

The unprotected battery is exactly the opposite of the protected battery. With no built in circuit board protection, the battery delivers raw power at whatever voltage it was designed for. The advantage of this type of battery is that it allows for greater modification of the entire electronic cigarette device. Unprotected batteries can be combined and stacked, used to create more heat and mist, and even provide a more powerful nicotine hit.

The Silver Bullet

The Silver Bullet isn't a type of battery; it's a type of e-cigarette that uses multiple voltage batteries and atomisers depending on your preference. For example, you can use the Silver Bullet with one 3.7V battery or two 3V batteries for a 6V total. What's the advantage of this type of setup? Most people will tell you it's all in the flavour. For some reason different juices taste better at low-voltage, while others taste better at high-voltage. And for people who are into making their own DIY juices, having multiple voltage options helps them produce the perfect juice for their tastes.

The Screwdriver

The Screwdriver, like the Silver Bullet, is not a type of battery. It's a type of electronic cigarette which uses batteries rated up to 900mAh. Not to get too technical on you, but this rating tells users how long the battery life is. A standard e-cig battery is rated at 130mAh and may have to be changed out by a heavy vaper after just an hour or so of use. But a 900mAh battery will last you all day in most cases.

If there's any downside to that Screwdriver it's the fact that it doesn't look anything like a regular tobacco cigarette. For serious vapers that's not a problem. But for those new to the practice, they might prefer using a personal vaporizer that looks more like a tobacco cigarette rather than something out of a Star Wars movie. On the other hand, if you're the type of person that enjoys being on the cutting edge, the Screwdriver might be just what you're looking for.

User Comments

Suresh Kumar15th June 2014

Comment:

Hi, while this page is very informative, I would like to comment that the protected battery and unprotected battery portions that are rather misleading. 1st off, lithium batteries does NOT suffer fro the 'memory' effect as described above, those are the characteristics of Ni-Cd (nickel cadmium) batteries. Even then Ni-Mh (nickel metal hydride) batteries have started to replace Ni-Cd batteries for consumer use, and the technological advancement in those have almost eliminated the 'memory' effect (Ni-Mh hardly has it, Ni-Cd still does). Lithium batteries does NOT have to be fully discharged before charging, rather the opposite is true. It will be less stressful for the battery to do multiple partial charges rather than one full discharge-charge cycle. This has been proven to be true, the research papers are available online. A typical voltage curve for a lithium battery is 4.2v at 100% charge, and for the most part (around 80% - 10%) around 3.6-3.8v, once it starts to dip lower than 10%, the voltage rapidly decreases to around 2.8V. If the battery is still used after this the battery will 'die'. It can't be charged anymore. A protected battery is a lithium battery with a protection circuit on-board that limits; over-charge, over-discharge, short-circuit and some also have overheating protection. The most important function is the over-discharge. As described above, once the battery charge is very low, and reaching the lower voltage threshold, the over-discharge will prevent the battery from discharging any more, thus one will not be able to 'kill' such a battery. The over-charge function is rarely uses, as charges already have that function built into them. The short-circuit function will cut-off voltage if it detects there is a short-circuit. An unprotected battery is the exact opposite; just the battery itself without any circuitry. Thus, it can be 'killed' easily if not used properly. What this means to vapers is a protected battery may not work with sub-ohm coils due to the circuitry detecting it as a short circuit. An unprotected battery can circumvent this, but, if one keeps using it until it dips below the lower threshold voltage, the battery is rendered 'dead', unable to be recharged. Both protected and unprotected batteries can be stacked or combined, and though the correct procedure is to use properly balanced batteries, this can be ignored due to the batteries being charged individually, and not in a pack. The information provided above is general and actual values will very depending on lithium tech used and also manufacturer.

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